Keziah in Kentucky: Meow, Indiana Talker, and Tornado

On Tuesday, we had a really good lesson with some of our friends. They are slowly gaining confidence in what they know and believe. It is so amazing to watch their testimonies grow. After their lesson we went tracting. We decided to take Sister Bastian's father's advice and make it fun. He told us to see how many times we could fit meow into our message. We tracked for around an hour and only knocked on about 20 doors, but in that time I said meow 14 times and Sister Bastian said it 9 times. It was super entertaining because no one seemed to register that we said meow instead on now. Our best door, we said meow 3 times in the course of one conversation! It definitely made door knocking a lot less monotonous. We thought we were so funny! Tuesday night, after tracting, we had dinner with Sister Matthews.

On Wednesday, we decided we were going to bike to one of our lessons in Evansville, so we did not go as far over for miles for the month. The lesson was 6.7 miles away from our apartment. We biked all the way there for the lesson, only for our friend not to open the door! So pretty much we went on a 13.4 mile bike ride for no important reason. It was a really nice bike ride and good weather, but not the most productive use of time.

After our bike ride, we drove out to Boonville to visit some of our friends there and check in on anyone in the area that had expressed interest in the past. We did not end up visiting that many people because … we ran into an Indiana talker (people who will just talk your ear off and you cannot get away). We had an address for someone who had referred themselves to the Elders before they pink washed the area, but only had one contact. (In that contact report, it said she told them she was part of the church of Satan - it should have been our warning to stay away.) We decided to drop by and try to visit her. There were people in the driveway of the house, so we went over to ask them if they knew someone by that name. The man replied that she was his relative. We asked if he knew how we could get in contact with her. He told us we couldn't because she was in jail for attempting to murder her child. He then gave us the entire run down of the story and how it was completely unexpected but wild story. He then started telling us about having lost loved ones, and his belief in reincarnation. The conversation got more crazy the longer it went on. This man and his wife were pagan and started talking about how much they hated Christians. We decided not to interrupt and point out that we were Christian. They then told us that prayers were just spells and they were both witches. They told us that they could cast spells and that usually creeps Christians out. We just thought it was hilarious. They also told us the government is stalking everyone through their phones and all Christian holidays are actually stolen pagan holidays. They said Christians are more pagan than Christian. We stood there listening to these people talk long enough that we got sunburned. We had to work so hard not to burst out laughing until we got back in the car. It was such a funny conversation and the people were nice, but definitely a little off their rocker.

Wednesday night we had a lesson with our friends that kind of bashed us last week. We were really stressed that it was going to go horribly, but it actually went well. Last week they were stuck on the Joseph Smith translations of the Bible, but this week we figured out that they had found a book that somehow combines the Bible, Joseph Smith translations, and the Pearl of Great Price into one and advertised it as the Joseph Smith translations of the Bible. Both parties were a lot less confused after we straightened that out. Proof that the Internet is not the best source to find correct information. Although it was a good lesson where we were able to answer many of their questions it was still two and a half hours long.

Wednesday was definitely a wild day, but it was full so much good!

On Thursday we got to weekly plan. I love weekly planning, because it makes me feel prepared for the coming week. After weekly planning we had two lessons. One of our lessons was with a member's granddaughter. It was really awkward because she just stared us down instead of answering any of our questions. The other lesson was with a member's wife. It was a super great lesson. She is always engaged in what we are teaching and makes such an effort to improve. She made us so happy because she read what we had asked her to and came prepared with questions. It is so relieving to teach someone who wants to learn and puts effort into learning.

On Friday we had district council. It was strange to have new people in the district because of transfers. We have an extremely young district. We calculated it and our district leader has been out almost longer than the rest of the district combined. Other than the district leader the longest anyone has been out is six months. After district council, we were going to visit people on our way back to the apartment, but due to severe weather we got told to go straight home. To make things interesting people got the clear to go out while we were in our apartment parking lot, so we got home and then had permission to leave. We decided to stay in the area due to the weather, but did not want to drive any further because our miles are drastically over this month, so we decided to walk. We went door knocking about a mile from our apartment and the weather was actually pretty good. Shortly after we got back, the mission president told all missionaries to head home for the night because the weather was getting worse. Around 9:30pm we got to take our second trip to the bathtub since getting to Indiana because of Tornadoes in the area. It was a wild adventure. Turns out the tornado that sent us to the bathtub destroyed houses and killed people. Our district leader showed us the path of the tornado. It went right past their apartment - I very glad they are okay.

On Saturday we watched General Conference with some of our ward members (the Porters and Sister Matthews). They were wonderful and it was a lot of fun. On Sunday we watched with the Browns and our friend Mellissa. One of the Brown's daughters decorated everyone's cup. The cup made me so happy, because it says, "Sister Soinsin." It was wonderful to get to listen to the prophet and his apostles talk.

Sunday night we started solidifying plans for our friend's baptism this coming Saturday. We also started making the program for it. I am so excited for him.

Continuing with my crochet theme in every email… This week I made a heart and a duck.

A quote I really liked from General Conference was, "We like the ten virgins have lamps, but do we have oil?" We cannot just rely on those around us to be prepared we have to be prepared to face our own challenges and become stronger. We have to fill our lives with Christ and his power.

Sister Sorenson

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